In the design of a microprocessor, instruction throughput, i.e., the number of instructions executed per second, is of primary importance. The number of instructions executed per second may be increased by various means. The most straightforward technique for increasing instruction throughput is by increasing frequency at which the microprocessor operates. Increased operating frequency, however, is limited by fabrication techniques and also results in the generation of excess heat.
Thus, modern day microprocessor designs are focusing on increasing the instruction throughput by using design techniques which increase the average number of instructions executed per clock cycle period. One such technique for increasing instruction throughput is "pipelining." Pipelining techniques segment each instruction flowing through the microprocessor into several portions, each of which can be handled by a separate stage in the pipeline. Pipelining increases the speed of a microprocessor by overlapping multiple instructions in execution. For example, if each instruction could be executed in six stages, and each stage required one clock cycle to perform its function, six separate instructions could be simultaneously executed (each executing in a separate stage of the pipeline) such that one instruction was completed on each clock cycle. In this ideal scenario, the pipelined architecture would have an instruction throughput which was six times greater than the non-pipelined architecture, which could complete one instruction every six clock cycles.
A second technique for increasing the speed of a microprocessor is by designing it to be a "superscalar." In a superscalar architecture, more than one instruction is issued per clock cycle. If no instructions were dependent upon other instructions in the flow, the increase in instruction throughput would be proportional to the degree of scaleability. Thus, if an architecture were superscalar to degree 2 (meaning that two instructions issued upon each clock cycle), then the instruction throughput in the machine would double.
A microprocessor may be both superpipelined (an instruction pipeline with many stages is referred to as "superpipelined") and superscalar to achieve a high instruction throughput. However, the operation of such a system in practice is far from the ideal situation where each instruction can be neatly executed in a given number of pipe stages and where the execution of instructions is not interdependent. In actual operation, instructions have varying resource requirements, thus creating interruptions in the flow of instructions through the pipeline. Further, the instructions typically have interdependencies; for example, an instruction which reads the value of a register is dependent on a previous instruction which writes the value to that same register--the second instruction cannot execute until the first instruction has completed its write to the register.
Consequently, while superpipelining and superscalar techniques can increase the throughput of a microprocessor, the instruction throughput is highly dependent upon the implementation of the superpipelined, superscalar architecture. One particular problem is controlling the flow of instructions in the pipeline increase the instruction throughput without increasing the frequency of the microprocessor. The efficiency of a superpipelined, superscalar machine is diminished as dependencies, or other factors, cause various stages to be inactive during operation of the microprocessor.
Therefore, a need has arisen for a microprocessor architecture with efficient control of the flow of instructions therein.